Mary Pellegrino – 11/4/09

This page was last updated on November 4, 2009.

Access to health care a basic right; Sister Mary Pellegrino, CSJ; Beaver County Times; November 4, 2009. An editor’s note asserts, “The writer is congregational moderator of Sisters of St. Joseph.”

In the interest of disclosure, I attended St. Titus grade school in Aliquippa during the 1950s and 1960s. The Sisters of St. Joseph operated St. Titus.

Below is a detailed critique of the letter.

“Compelled by the Gospel of Jesus and our mission to respond to the ‘dear neighbor’ without distinction, the Sisters of St. Joseph of Baden, along with the U.S. Federation of the Sisters of St. Joseph Leadership Council, add our voices to that of NETWORK, a Catholic social justice lobby, in support of health care reform.

“We believe that access to affordable, quality health care is a basic human right and a fundamental social good for all persons.

“The current state of health care in the United States constitutes social sin that must be eradicated through broad and deep engagement of the public conscience.”

[RWC] Wrong, Sister Pellegrino. A government-run healthcare monopoly (“health care reform”) as you appear to advocate would be the “social sin” because it would grant the government nearly complete control over nearly every aspect of our lives. In the “old days,” the Catholic Church, including the Sisters of St. Joseph, didn’t believe that was a good thing.

“We advocate for a quality health care system that is accessible to everyone in the United States, affordable and comprehensive.”

[RWC] I’m sure Sister Pellegrino means well, but a visit to the NETWORK website shows NETWORK is just another leftist activist group that supports just about every leftist position, with the possible exception of abortion. I wrote “possible exception” of abortion because it is not mentioned among “The issues we work on …”

Please read my paper entitled “Healthcare.”